Page 3317 - Week 10 - Thursday, 19 October 2006
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I think it is quite important to highlight that 28 vehicles came on line during the previous government’s reign, and only six since 2003—eight in the full life so far of the Stanhope government. That is failure. That is failure to address the issues.
I seek leave to table the memos. There is a memo which details the problems. It shows that there are stress fractures in Molonglo 10 and Gungahlin 10. Surely standard replacement or standard maintenance and vehicle attention would find that.
Leave not granted.
MR SMYTH: Leave is not granted. You do not want your own memo. You are embarrassed. That is fine. We will think about whether we will fight that one. There it is. They do not want to table their memo. They do not want in the Hansard the true state of affairs. They are going to hide behind their numbers in this place because they do not want to hear or see the truth written in the Hansard and their failure to adequately maintain the fleet recorded for posterity. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
You then have to ask the question, “How long has the government known about this problem?” When was this table first created; and when was it sent out. It was emailed out on 9 October this year at 5.40 in the afternoon. I will read it. It is signed by Michael Ross. It says:
Captains & volunteers
Apologies for not getting back to you last week with these - a bit of a fire on. As discussed at the pre-season workshop—
They discussed this pre-season—
the attached spreadsheet highlights vehicles that through a combination of age, roadworthiness and fireline reliability are flagged as possible second response.
These 14 vehicles have been drawn from the pool of 23 vehicles that currently exceed the replacement age profile (based on national standards). Those that have exceeded the agreed life span by more than 25% have been identified in the table and names marked in yellow.
Plague yellow. There it is—it stands out. Fourteen vehicles out of 23—more than 25 per cent—were old. I would be embarrassed too if this were tabled, Chief Minister, because it highlights your failings. It continues:
As the next step the RFS is forming a small team—
There is the answer: let us not buy vehicles. We will have another team. It is the Minister Corbell model, where you cannot change the bank accounts until you have a small team—
to now specifically individually assess these identified vehicles for condition and suitability for fire line duties and reliability on the fire line. These inspections will commence this week.
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